The Rolling Stones in Mono covers the formative years of “The Greatest Rock & Roll Band in the World.” During this era, most rock and pop recordings were originally recorded in mono, with stereo often an afterthought, dealt with only following the completion of the original (mono) version of a given track. In short, mono reigned and this was, indeed, the case for the Rolling Stones during the period. While typical playback systems of the time were less than sophisticated, the original mono recordings, especially as heard through quality components, were of the highest audio quality and had a powerful and very direct impact. “You felt you were in the room . . . listening to exactly what went down in the studio, no frills, no nothing,” Keith Richards wrote in his autobiography, Life. “Rock was a completely new musical form,” Mick Jagger explained in a 1995 Rolling Stone interview. “It hadn’t been around for ten years when we started doing it . . . You felt like one of the chosen few, one of the only ones in the world who would get to play with this new toy. We had evangelical fervor.” Late recording engineer Dave Hassinger explained how he mixed his ’64-’66 work for the Stones in mono, “They always played together at the same time,” Hassinger said. “They would run the parts down, work out the changes here and there, nail it down, then start recording.”

Rolling Stone senior editor David Fricke, in his 5,000-word essay that accompanies the set, writes, “The Rolling Stones in Mono is the full studio account of that first decade of history and mayhem, newly remastered with unprecedented fidelity and revelatory detail.” His commentaries are included with the vinyl and CD box sets as part of a 4-color deluxe 48 page lie flat book that features numerous rare photos by renowned photographer Terry O’Neill. The 16 LPs or 15 CDs are housed in the original full color album jackets that fit along with the book into a one piece specially crafted box.

The Rolling Stones in Mono was mastered by acclaimed GRAMMY® award winning engineer Bob Ludwig at Gateway Mastering. For the project he utilized Direct Stream Digital (DSD) transfers from the original master recordings, with a sampling rate of 2,822,400. Lacquer cutting for vinyl was performed at Abbey Road Studios by Alex Wharton and Sean Magee. All vinyl box sets will be numbered and pressed on 180-gram vinyl. The Rolling Stones in Mono project has been overseen by Teri Landi, ABKCO’s Grammy award winning Chief Audio Engineer.

It’s often unfair to compare the Rolling Stones to the Beatles but in the case of the group’s mono mixes, it’s instructive. Until the 2009 release of the box set The Beatles in Mono, all of the Fab Four’s mono mixes were out of print. That’s not the case with the Rolling Stones. Most of their ’60s albums — released on Decca in the U.K., London in the U.S. — found mono mixes sneaking onto either the finished sequencing or various singles compilations, so the 2016 box The Rolling Stones in Mono only contains 56 heretofore unavailable mono mixes among its 186 tracks. To complicate things further, the box — which runs 15 discs in its CD version, 16 LPs in its vinyl incarnation — sometimes contains both the British and American releases of a particular title (Out of Our Heads and Aftermath), while others are available in only one iteration (Between the Buttons is only present in the U.K. version). All this is for the sake of expedience: this is the easiest way to get all the mono mixes onto the box with a minimal amount of repetition. To that end, there’s a bonus disc called Stray Tracks — with artwork that plays off the censored artwork for Beggars Banquet — collecting the singles that never showed up on an official album, or at least any of the albums that made the box. Along with the odd decision to have the CD sleeves be slightly larger than a mini-LP replica (they’re as big as a jewel box, so they’re larger than a shrunk vinyl sleeve, a size that’s rarely seen in other releases), this is the only quibble on what is otherwise an excellent set. The sound — remastered again after the 2002 overhaul for hybrid SACDs — is bold and colorful, with the earliest albums carrying a wallop and the latter records feeling like they’re fighting to be heard in two separate channels and all the better for it. If nothing here provides a revelation — none of the mixes are radically different, the way that some Beatles mono sides are — this nevertheless is the best the Rolling Stones have sounded on disc (or on vinyl) and there’s considerable care in this package, from the replications of the sleeves to the extensive notes from David Fricke. Plus, hearing the Stones in mono winds up being a hot wire back toward the ’60s: this feels raw and vibrant, as alive as the band was in the ’60s. ~~AllMusic Review by Stephen Thomas Erlewine

Tracklist:

The Rolling Stones (UK, 1964)
1-1 Route 66
1-2 I Just Want To Make Love To You
1-3 Honest I Do
1-4 I Need You Baby
1-5 Now I’ve Got A Witness (Like Uncle Phil And Uncle Gene)
1-6 Little By Little
1-7 I’m A King Bee
1-8 Carol
1-9 Tell Me (You’re Coming Back)
1-10 Can I Get A Witness
1-11 You Can Make It If You Try
1-12 Walking The Dog

12 X 5 (1964)
2-1 Around And Around
2-2 Confessin’ The Blues
2-3 Empty Heart
2-4 Time Is On My Side
2-5 Good Times, Bad Times
2-6 It’s All Over Now
2-7 2120 South Michigan Avenue
2-8 Under The Boardwalk
2-9 Congratulations
2-10 Grown Up Wrong
2-11 If You Need Me
2-12 Susie Q

The Rolling Stones No. 2 (UK, 1965)
3-1 Everybody Needs Somebody To Love
3-2 Down Home Girl
3-3 You Can’t Catch Me
3-4 Time Is On My Side
3-5 What A Shame
3-6 Grown Up Wrong
3-7 Down The Road Apiece
3-8 Under The Boardwalk
3-9 I Can’t Be Satisfied
3-10 Pain In My Heart
3-11 Off The Hook
3-12 Susie Q

Out of Our Heads (US, 1965)
5-1 Mercy, Mercy
5-2 Hitch Hike
5-3 The Last Time
5-4 That’s How Strong My Love Is
5-5 Good Times
5-6 I’m All Right
5-7 (I Can’t Get No) Satisfaction
5-8 Cry To Me
5-9 The Under Assistant West Coast Promotion Man
5-10 Play With Fire
5-11 The Spider And The Fly
5-12 One More Try

December’s Children (And Everybody’s) (1965)
7-1 She Said “Yeah”
7-2 Talkin’ About You
7-3 You Better Move On
7-4 Look What You’ve Done
7-5 The Singer, Not The Song
7-6 Route 66
7-7 Get Off Of My Cloud
7-8 I’m Free
7-9 As Tears Go By
7-10 Gotta Get Away
7-11 Blue Turns To Grey
7-12 I’m Moving On

Their Satanic Majesties Request (1967)
12-1 Sing This All Together
12-2 Citadel
12-3 In Another Land
12-4 2000 Man
12-5 Sing This All Together (See What Happens)
12-6 She’s A Rainbow
12-7 The Lantern
12-8 Gomper
12-9 2000 Light Years From Home
12-10 On With The Show